


Words and Actions

by Edellin



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-05-08
Updated: 2012-05-08
Packaged: 2017-11-05 00:44:23
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,466
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/400019
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Edellin/pseuds/Edellin
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>It's true what the muggle say; Watch your thoughts for they become actions. Padma never thought that she would act without thinking the situation too much and Parvati never expected that she would have to be the responsible that would think too much.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Words and Actions

**Author's Note:**

  * For [hannelore](https://archiveofourown.org/users/hannelore/gifts).



Padma climbed slowly the familiar, tight, spiral staircase leading to her house’s common room. Everything was on the outside the same but from the moment she and the rest of the students sat down and noticed the new headmaster, Severus Snape, and the new teachers, she knew that things were going to be very different this year. It wasn’t just the war or what happened with Harry. 

It was the looks everyone had.

Slytherins that seemed even more snobbish than before, a headmaster that everyone was afraid of and new teachers whose eyes betrayed they hadn’t come for good in the school.

The looks between friends. How everyone saw in each pair of eyes of the other three houses, the same feelings, the same thoughts. Even the brave Gryffindors, like her sister, that most of the time were reckless and spoke their minds before thinking …. Even in their eyes… you saw the same feeling that had taken over everyone but the Slytherins.

Fear.

There was an enemy and everyone knew, even before they came into the school, that this enemy had gotten into the school, had infiltrated their safety-house-school and was not going to let anything be the same again.

Padma lay onto her bed and sighed deeply.

There was a war going on everywhere. Outside of Hogwarts, throughout all of Europe – maybe even slowly spreading beyond the continent as well – and now inside Hogwarts as well. With Dumbledore dead, the school had fallen at the hands of the enemy. The war was going to a subtle one within the walls of the castle but it was going to be a war. 

The Slytherins against pretty much the rest of the school.

Padma wanted to believe that this would end quickly. That somehow Harry would find the way very soon and end the war. 

“Padma!” one of the girls she shared her dorm with called from the door. “Come down at the common room…. there have been some changes at the rules and schedule.”

Changes. The war had already started and the enemy had pretty much made the first move because, Padma knew, these changes were not good ones. 

She slowly got up and went to the common room where all the other Ravenclaws were gathered around someone – she couldn’t see who that was – and listened attentively to what he was saying.

“Also, from now on the subjects Muggles Studies and Dark Arts – previously called Defence Against Dark Arts – are obligatory to all the students, from all the houses. For that reason, the school has made sure that no other class will clash with them. There have also been some changes about the use of magic. The students are being permitted to use more spells – including curses – as long as they happen during the supervision of a teacher in a class, with the demand of a teacher…”

After that Padma stopped listening and just looked around at the room. 

She was right. The changes were for the worse. Hogwarts was going to be a very different place now than it was all the years before.

XXXX

Padma nearly ran out of the classroom in which she had her last subject with one thought in mind; find Parvati as soon as possible.

She had to make sure that her brave sister wouldn’t do or say anything reckless around the new professors. Parvati was a Gryffindor, which meant that her bravery sometimes overpowered her ability to keep her mouth shut and have patience until the situation changed; she’d want to be the one to change the situation.

Only this time things were very dangerous. Padma vowed that she was going to make sure that her sister wasn’t going to be tortured in the Dark Arts or Muggle studies classes, even if it meant doing a spell on her sister to force her to behave a certain way… she’d just need to find a spell like that. There had to be one! 

It wasn’t that Padma didn’t immediately hate how things were going to be in Hogwarts this year. She hated the new teachers, the new classes, the new headmaster but she was not going to get killed recklessly. To find a way to survive this whole year and what was going to follow, they had to be diplomatic and not gather unwanted attention.

The two teachers… they were more sinister than Snape. And they had power over the school. The school was being controlled by Slytherins. The Headmaster was a Slytherin, the Deputy Headmisters were two Slytherins, replacing McGonagall after so many years of holding that position, and giving to the Slytherin students the right, the power to be as Slytherin as they wanted to be. 

It was well known that Slytherins and Gryffindors’ rivalry wasn’t a simple school rivalry… Gryffindors were the ones in danger the most… both for being Gryffindors in the name and for being everything that a Gryffindor was supposed to be. 

She had to find her sister as soon as possible. 

Most students were going to go to the dining room to eat but Padma knew that her sister was not going to be there; she always had this tendency to stop eating when things around her were not the way she wanted them to be. When she was young, this characteristic made her appear like a spoiled child but Padma knew that it was deeper than that. It was because Pravati had a very strong sense of justice; she couldn’t stand when wrongs were taking place around her. She couldn’t stand it.

And that inability was what worried Padma. She was going to snap… soon, very soon. And the only way to stop that and protect her from doing anything reckless in an environment that was already turned against her, was to talk to her. To convince her that things were not going to be helped if they just said their opinions to the teachers directly. It needed to be done differently. 

Parvati was going to be angry at her. She was going to call her a coward and demand an explanation. Padma was going to give it… and as it usually happened, Parvati was not going to listen. Only that this time, the punishment for not going according to the rules was not a detention or a angry look, this time was going to be a crucio curse or a way of torture.

She had to be focused this time. She had to be firm and demanding and strict and somehow to manage to force her sister to do what she was told, even if it was against her nature.   
She saw Parvati’s long black hair, like hers, as she was walking quite quickly towards the stairs that lead to the Gryffindor common room. 

“Parvati!” Padma called. Parvati stopped walking and Lavender next to her sister turned to look at Padma. She saw the girl whisper something at her sister’s ear and then her sister whispered something at hers. 

Padma waited. She had long ago accepted that in their-once-so-close relationship there was now another person indirectly involved. Parvati loved Lavender very much. They shared things that she once shared with Padma. They had similarities that Parvati had wanted as a child to have with Padma.

It wasn’t that they didn’t love each other, or trust or talk to. It was that they weren’t each others favourite friends anymore. 

It usually didn’t annoy her that Lavender was always with Parvati but at that moment Padma found herself quite furious at the third girl. 

“Parvati,” she called again, this time in stricter tone, indicating that she really wanted to talk to her. That she would even follow them to their common room and stay outside if she didn’t talk to her. Parvati turned to look at her sister and then at her best friend. Lavender nodded and Parvati started walking towards her sister.

“We have to talk,” Padma announced and grabbed her sister’s hand, ready to pull her somewhere where they could talk privately. 

“Then talk,” Parvati said pulled her hand back. There was a hidden anger in her voice and Padma knew why it was there. 

“Are you still angry?” she asked and sighed. “I thought you understood.” 

“That doesn’t mean I am not angry.” Parvati answered back. 

“Please… this is not the time to be angry over me talking to our parents about what happened last year.”

Parvati looked at Lavender and then at her sisters again. “I know why you are here.” She said in a whispering voice. “I know why. And you know that talking won’t change anything.”

Padma suddenly hugged her sister tightly and waited until her twin would hug her back. Slowly Parvati raised her hands and placed them at her sisters back. “Promise me that you won’t do something rush. Promise me that you will talk to me before you do anything that could get you in trouble.”

Parvati didn’t answer. She just stroked her sister’s back.

“Parvati… things have changed. It’s possible that you will get yourself killed or permanetely damaged if you are not careful,” she warned her sister in a pleading voice. “Please.”

“And is it better to sit and let people have the power to do anything they want to you and everyone else? To make Slytherins the ruling house in the school without even fighting it?” her sister asked back. There was vindictiveness in her voice and Padma knew that it was directed at her. Their personalities clashed too much and during the situation they faced – and the ones they were going to face – their differences were going to make them clash even more.

“No,” she finally answered. “That’s not what I am saying. I am not a Gryffindor, Parvati. Bravery is not my most notable characteristic but that doesn’t mean I am coward. I just think we should not do things that would be too risky. We should take things slowly,” she started explaining to her sister. “We are in a disadvantageous position so we have to play smart… and wait for the moment when the enemy will be weak and we’ll be able to strike. If we do something too soon, then we will weaken ourselves too much and when the major battle comes, we won’t be able to help the way we would have liked.”

Parvati didn’t answer her. She looked around and then whispered at her sister’s ears. “You shouldn’t say things like that in places like this. Someone could hear you.”

“You weren’t willing to go to another place to talk,” Padma answered back. “I love you… don’t leave me an only child.”

Parvati nodded. “I’ll try,” 

“Just come talk to me before you do anything…. That you know I’d tell you to not do unless you prepare yourself enough for it. And during classes, please be at your best behaviour.” 

Parvati smiled and nodded again at her sister. “I’ll try,” she promised and turned her back at her sister, walking towards Lavender, who was waiting for her at the beginning of the stairs. 

Padma slowly turned her back as well and started walking away. She didn’t know where she was walking. Her feet lead her to a place, like they had a mind on their own. 

She had wanted that conversation to go a different way; instead of hearing that she would try, she would have preferred to hear that she was going to do exactly what she had asked of her but Parvati was never someone that liked to listen to her. 

When they were younger, they joked that they really should have been one girl instead of two. Parvati was too energetic and Padma thought too much. If they were one, there would be perfect balance but instead… Parvati was doing the things she wanted and Padma was the voice of reason and self-preservation that tried to convince her that she shouldn’t do them. And because doing something is always better than finding reasons not to do it, Parvati always ignored her sister’s comments and instructions. 

Padma found herself at the entrance of the room of requirement, the secret place where she and so many other students trained with Harry during their fifth year. She quietly entered the room and found herself in a completely different room than the one she remembered during her fifth year. It was a storeroom, full of piles of things. She slowly walked inside the room and gazed in amazement everything inside the room. 

There were books, chairs, sofas, jewels, bottles, glasses and so many other things. It was an endless pile of things that had been gathered here… and she happened to stumble inside that room. She slowly walked around the room, looking fascinated by everything inside the room. 

They were all shiny and some even more than it, but for some reason she couldn’t help but like it more than all the others around it. She slowly walked closer to it and picked it up. It was a small locker with a rose engraved on its front. 

It was so simple and yet, she found herself instantly loving it. It was beautiful in its simplicity and because of it. She put it into her pocket, deciding that she was going to examine it later at her room. She was not going to be able to sleep for a while this night, so it would be interesting to have something to look and wonder about. Apart from how bad this year was going to be. Her mind was going to dream – or day dream – about various hypothetical situations that could take place – and she knew that they were going to take place – the days that would follow. 

The protests, the fights, the punishments…. And nothing would be the same as before because Dumbledore was not in the school to protect it anymore. 

Now there was Snape… and the man was known for his favoritism towards the Slytherin students and how cruel and unjust he could be towards the rest of the school. How cruel he may be just because deeply that is his nature… 

XXXX

Her roommates had stayed to eat at the dining hall and start their study plan – Ravenclaws are geeks; they start studying form the very first day of classes – but Padma didn’t feel like being a student for the day. It seemed so wrong to worry about grades and exams when a war was fast approaching…. And the evidence showed that they were currently the losing side. They could all die before the year was over… Harry Potter along with his two friends were searching for the way to defeat you-know-who and restore peace in the magical world. 

Padma hoped that he would find the way to do it sooner than later. She knew the boy – not well but she had talked to him a couple of times and her sister had talked about him quite a lot during the previous years – he certainly was trying to find a solution to the war, risking his own life in the process – a typical brave Gryffindor – but Padma feared that his attempts might be in vain… or not enough. She had heard that Dumbledore was also trying to find a way to defeat you-know-who before his death since he always feared and believed that he was going to return one day and he hadn’t managed to find one… so how could Harry? 

But maybe Dumbledore had found many things that could help the boy and his friends find a solution…. That’s what she hoped. Otherwise… otherwise it seemed like a lost case to Padma; Harry had defeated you-know-who without knowing how, without remembering how so it was not so impossible that in a new battle between the two of them, Harry would lose. 

Padma sighed and lay on her bed, taking out of her pocket the little, silver locker she had found. She brought it closer to her eyes and examined it, now that she was free to do it. It was silver, shiny and very beautiful. Mysterious as well... she couldn't describe how or why she thought that... but she knew that it had a story. It wasn't the first time that she had a feeling that something was that way... her intuition was always strong and had been proven true many times. 

Maybe it belonged to someone she knew. Maybe to someone great from the past. Maybe to a simple person that had been a student a century ago... all the possibilities about who had previously owned the pendant fascinated her. It was a puzzle... and she a Ravenclaw.

There was no problem she couldn't solve.

XXXX

After a month of repetitive activities, any kind of situation should start to become familiar – no matter how unpleasant it was - but Padma found herself being less accepting of the situation in the school than she originally was. She couldn’t place exactly what annoyed her so much about the situation; it was so many things…

But she knew what was the final straw… the one thing that even someone with her voice of reason – that had always convinced her to not do things in her life – couldn’t turn a blind eye to. That voice of reason was for the first time silent as she approached Crabbe and Goyle that were cursing a younger student. 

She didn’t think that she was not going to do much, that she was going to be in clear danger the moment the two Slytherin boys decided to make her their next victim – and she was probably going to be their victim for some time – or that she was not able to do anything to them; she just wanted the kid to get away…

So she approached them and in a no-Padma voice she ordered them to leave the kid alone and pick someone their own size. She didn’t remember much of that moment but she was certain that the two Slytherin boys laughed at first and ignored what she said but got awfully serious the moment she took out her wand. It was like the moment she challenged them with her wand and actually threatened them, their whole demeanor changed. 

And that was the moment that wonderful little voice in her head started talking again. Only that it was too late, Padma too angry and falsely confident that she can take them and the voice a couple of minutes too late… because even if she had tried to get away without actually fighting, they would still go after her; like when someone interrupts a wild animal from hunting and feeding… If one does that, then the animal loses its prey – or loses interest in it – and makes the one who interrupted it its new prey… That was exactly what happened. Crabbe and Goyle just lost interest in the younger kid and decided to attack her…

At that moment her memory was lost. She knew that she didn’t run but she remembered going a couple of steps back and then being in extreme pain as Crabbe performed the Cruciatius curse on her. 

That was how she ended up being in the Hospital Wing. Probably the little boy went to call for help.

“Padma!” someone screamed approaching her bed. It was quite difficult to understand who it was because she couldn’t hear well – maybe a side effect of the curse – but she was quite sure that it was a female’s voice. “You are awake! You are finally awake!” Her sister’s face suddenly appeared in front of her – full of tears and with red eyes and nose strangely - and Padma found herself hugged tightly by Parvati.

The Ravenclaw twin tried to get up but found herself unable to even move her hands. Her eyes opened alarmed and opened her mouth to talk but no sound came out. It was painfully dry.

“Water.” Parvati got up alarmed and jumped up. “Madam Pomfrey! Can I have a glass of water please?” 

XXXXX

Parvati like she did the previous day came to her bedside the moment she finished with her classes and stayed there – talking on her own since Padma found it still a bit difficult to talk about her day – until visiting hours were over and she had to return to her house’s common room. 

Padma loved her sister and knew her well but that didn’t mean she stopped being surprised by some of her strangest quirks… like the one of her talking happily and cheerfully about things of non-importance at one moment and without any warning changing to subjects of extreme importance and caution.

That was one of them.

“… and that was how Lavender got her small revenge for yesterday at Potions on Parkinson. Merlin! That girls is horrible – especially now that she thinks she can be the queen of the school – and snobby and totally out of control. How could we be friends with her when we were children? I mean she is not just teasing people, she is taunting them, humiliating them and now she has three professors in the school to laugh along with her and no one able to smack her and punish her for being… well a Slytherin.” She stopped to got a breath (finally!) “She’s got to be stopped,” she announced in a whisper that only Padma could hear. “What they did to you, it can’t be overlooked. What they are doing to everyone… can’t be overlooked.”

“Parvati,” Padma touched lightly her sister’s hand. “Don’t do anything rush please. Be careful and protect yourself!” she reasoned with her younger sister – who was currently thinking of doing something that could lead her in a position like the one Padma currently was. “You promised,” she reminded her.

Parvati looked at her and smiled a bit. “It’s so weird, you know…. you telling me to be careful and listen to reason while you are the one in the hospital.” Her twin lay next to her, resting her face on Padma’s chest like she always did when they were little. It seemed so long ago when the time when they were little. “I was really scared for you, you know. I never expected you to do anything like that…”

Padma ran a hand through Parvati’s long hair and smiled as she kissed the top of her head. “I am sorry I worried you.”

“It’s just… I never expected that I would have to be responsible for you. It was always the other way around and now… now I have to protect you from your new-found impulsiveness,” Parvati said and closed her eyes. “You got horrible timing you know. You finally decided to grow a spine and you did it during a time that everyone non-Slytherin is in danger and in a place that you were alone with two Slytherin boys.I mean… you couldn’t pick a worse situation.”

Padma laughed at her sister words slightly. “I guess if I wasn’t clever enough for Ravenclaw, I’d be a Gryffindor… I got a brainless, impulsive, brave little hero inside me that has finally decided to come out.”

“Who would have thought?!” Parvati remarked and the two girls chuckled together. “But still… one of two boys was Goyle. Goyle! The Goyle that has had a crush on you since second year. I mean you have to be extra careful around him now… he might actually rape you.”

“Parvati!” 

“Padma”

“I don’t need more things to worry about now. I am already afraid that they will strike me again just because I talked back at them. I don’t need to be afraid that I will be sexually harassed too.” Padma protested in frustration.

Parvati didn’t answer. She just rolled on her side and hugged her sister tighter. “I am going to make sure that you won’t get harassed or tortured again this year.”

“Really?” Padma asked raising an eyebrow in surprise. “Are you going to install patrol groups in the hallways for young girls to walk securely or have me escorted by a bodyguard all day?” Padma joked and laughed a bit.

Parvati didn’t answer, just smiled to herself. “Maybe,” she finally murmured and kissed lightly her sister’s cheek. “You are not the only one that doesn’t want to be left an only child, Padma.”

Padma smiled at her sister’s words. “I love you, Parvati.”

“Me too.” The clock finally stroke and the two girls looked up to see the time. “I have to go.” Parvati said and got up from bed. She grabbed her things from the flour and started walking away when she abruptly stopped and came back. “Actually… I found at your bed this” she started saying and took out of her pocket the small, pretty, silver locker Padma had found at the beginning of the year. “I slept with it yesterday… and well… you know that I have seer abilities right?”

Padma rolled her eyes for a moment but nodded after a minute. If she wanted to become like Trelawney that was something Padma couldn’t stop Parvati from.

“Well I slept with it and… I saw a very interesting story from the past.”

Padma raised her eyebrow. “You are sure you saw something true and not just a dreamt up a story?”

“I am sure!” Parvati said in a fake-offended tone. 

“So…? Whose is it?”

Parvati opened her mouth but then closed it and crossed her arms over her chest. “You recently proved to be a Gryffindor inside so I’ll let you see if you have a seer in you like me. Sleep with it and try to find the memory attached to the object, what it symbolizes.” 

“You want me to imagine who it belongs to in my sleep, Parvati?” Padma asked in disbelief. “You believe in things like that, I don’t.” 

“Give it a try. But just so you know… it takes time to see the whole story.” 

“Yeah… a lifetime until you die and as a ghost find the previous owners of the locker and ask them of its story.” Padma told her sister. “It takes time indeed to see the whole story.”

“Oh come on!” Parvati said and started walking away. “And don’t forget what I said. You don’t have any reason to worry… I’ll make sure that no one is going to do anything to you again,” and she was gone.

No one is going to do anything to you again

This sounded bad… and yet Padma did not worry as much about her sister as she thought she would. She tightened her hand on the small object and brought it closer to her face. 

“So you got a story as I thought you did,” she murmured in interest, her curiosity picking up again about that small relic of the past that she had accidentally come to possess.


End file.
